


UnderBones: What Remains

by bones96



Category: Bones (TV), Undertale (Video Game)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fusion, Alternate Universe - Undertale, But if you can name a Bones character there is a probable chance they will make some appearance, Canon-Typical Violence, F/F, F/M, I've only tagged who I think the main/major characters are, NaNoWriMo, Takes place after Max's death, Undertale Pacifist Route, Undertale fans can probably figure out who the other major deaths will be, aka Acting out the events of Undertale, typical for Undertale moreso than for Bones, with one surprise exception that Bones fans might figure out
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-06-17
Updated: 2019-10-04
Packaged: 2020-05-13 16:13:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 6,074
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19254679
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bones96/pseuds/bones96
Summary: A little girl who is struggling with the recent loss of her devoted grandfather wakes up to find herself in a mystical world inhabited by monsters. Accompanied by a mischievous little dog, she traverses through this world in a quest to return to her parents, meeting a strange assortment of oddly familiar characters along the way.Cross-posted to Fanfiction.net





	1. Prologue/Discovery

**Author's Note:**

> This is an obtuse, overplanned, overworked mess written for an extremely niche audience of people who love forensic procedurals but also play indie video games (for all I know I might be the only member of said audience). This is a passion project so dear to my heart that it helped me win NaNoWriMo for the first time in seven years. I am historically terrible about multi-chapter fics, but then again, I have never before been able to say when publishing a first chapter that I already have a sizable rough draft for a good two-thirds of the rest of the story. God only knows how long this journey will take or if I’ll even get to the end of it. But as long as I take it chapter by chapter I’m optimistic.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is an obtuse, overplanned, overworked mess written for an extremely niche audience of people who love forensic procedurals but also play indie video games (for all I know I might be the only member of said audience). This is a passion project so dear to my heart that it helped me win NaNoWriMo for the first time in seven years. I am historically terrible about multi-chapter fics, but then again, I have never before been able to say when publishing a first chapter that I already have a sizable rough draft for a good two-thirds of the rest of the story. God only knows how long this journey will take or if I’ll even get to the end of it. But as long as I take it chapter by chapter I’m optimistic.

The little girl knew what happened to people when they died. She was only seven years old, but she was the daughter of a forensic scientist and a federal agent. They spared her the goriest details but she knew: dead bodies decompose slowly, rotting away bit by bit until all that remains of them are bones. Their souls go to heaven, but they will never really be around again. It was a little sad, a little scary, but it was a natural part of life.

  
Grandpa had always tried to protect her from life’s sad, scary truths. Mommy and Daddy would do anything to keep the little girl safe, of course, but Grandpa sometimes acted like it was his only job in the world to keep her a little girl. It was the last thing he had ever done. She’d heard a few gunshots over the TV, but she didn’t really know what had happened that day. She only remembered Grandpa shielding her and her brother with his arms and kissing them both on the forehead. And that was just how he wanted it. He wouldn’t want her to think of him in pain, or of his soul leaving him or of his body rotting underground.

  
So it was hard for the little girl to believe that anything she knew about death could really apply to Grandpa. He had to still be around somehow. The little girl was so certain of it that it kept her up at night.

  
When they heard her crying, Mommy and Daddy came into her room and knelt together beside her. There was a determined fire in Daddy’s eyes, promising to protect her from whatever monster hid under her bed. When they asked what was wrong, the little girl turned to her parents and asked the same question about Grandpa she had asked dozens of times already. Mommy started to answer but Daddy squeezed her hand and she shut her mouth in a sad smile, choosing instead to stroke the little girl’s hair while Daddy told her about heaven. The little girl took comfort in both of them, in Daddy’s faith and in knowing that Mommy would only ever tell her what she knew to be the truth.

  
Doubts still nagged at the little girl. As Mommy wiped away her tears, she asked if they could stay with her until she fell asleep. Her parents glanced at each other and together, they agreed. They both grabbed her hand and whispered bedtime stories to her while she closed her eyes and, finally, enveloped by the love of her family, drifted off.

* * *

The little girl opened her eyes to a thin stream of sunlight coming from above. She stirred and immediately knew she was not in her bed. Drowsy and groggy, she sat up and gauged her surroundings. The light was coming from the mouth of a cave, meters above her head. Vines scaled the walls of the cave, which didn’t slope at all. She looked down. She been lying in a bed of orange and yellow flowers — marigolds, she thought they were called.

  
Being careful not to crush any of the pretty flowers, the little girl got to her feet and puzzled out how she had gotten here, making observations and coming to conclusions based on them just like Mommy had taught her. It would have been a mighty fall to the bottom of this cavern, but the little girl didn’t feel like she had fallen; she wasn’t in any pain, just a little lightheaded. She supposed she could have crawled down the vines, but if that was the case her hands would have been scratched up like crazy, and her hands were fine.

  
This must have been a dream. That was the most logical explanation. The little girl smiled, satisfied with her conclusion.

  
Apart from the one beam of sunlight, the cavern was full of inky blackness. The only other thing that was visible was one more marigold standing by itself, far from the others. The bright color of its cascading petals lit the way for the little girl as she approached. She reached for the flower, but before she could grab it, it moved. As if pushed by some invisible wind, the flower’s stem bent. Its petals fluttered. Underneath the petals, there were two eyes and a smiling mouth.

  
“Hello there!” said the flower in a man’s voice. “Are you new to the Underground?”

  
The little girl stared wordlessly.

  
“I thought so,” said the flower. “Sorry if I seem too excited. It’s not every day I see a new face! You must be so frightened! Are you? Are you frightened?” It didn’t give her a chance to answer. “Oh yeah, I can tell you’re really scared. In that case, I think you need someone to show you around! Show you how things work down here! I could be the perfect guide.” The marigold tilted its — his? — head. A few petals fell over one of his beady black eyes, giving the impression of a shaggy haircut framing his face. “Plants don’t usually have names, you know. But if it’ll be easier, you can call me Planty.”

  
Uneasy, the little girl finally spoke up, asking the flower what exactly “down here” was.

  
“I told you already, this is the Underground!” Planty answered. “That’s so rude, to not listen when someone introduces themselves. I’ll show you how it’s done, by asking you a question and then _listening_ to your answer. Tell me: Are you a human?”

  
The little girl answered affirmatively.

  
“You are. Hmmm.” Planty tilted his head, observing her carefully. His hollow smile never faltered. “How much do you know about magic?”

  
Indignantly, the little girl asserted that there was no such thing as magic.

  
“Oh, no, no, that’s where you’re wrong! Magic exists, and if you want a chance of thriving down here you should know how it works.Take a step back! I’ll give a little demonstration.” Several bright flashes of light shone in sequence above Planty, illuminating the cave but blinding the little girl just enough so she couldn’t see it. Electricity in the air made the hairs on the little girl’s arms stick up as the flashes of light turned into floating white orbs, sitting in an arc above the flower’s head. Each one of them dwarfed the tiny flower. “This is the kingdom of the monsters!” Planty said as the orbs danced around him, unaffected by gravity. “Us monsters use magic to communicate. Monsters aren’t too used to outsiders, so when they first see you, monsters will put on a magic display as a challenge. If you refuse to accept the challenge, they won’t talk to you. But if you accept, and offer to take down their shields by hand, that’s how you make an instant friend. What do you say?” The orbs arranged themselves into a question mark above his head. “You ready to try it out?”

  
The little girl smiled cautiously and nodded.

  
“Excellent,” said Planty. “I’m always happy to be of service. The only thing in the way of our friendship are these pellets.” The orbs arranged themselves in a horizontal line halfway between Planty and the girl, resting at about her shoulder level. “All you have to do is clear them away!”

  
The smell of electricity in the air grew more intense as the little girl approached the orbs. She reached to bat them away, just like she’d been told. Her palm barely brushed against the orb and incomprehensible images of grief and hatred ripped through her brain. An intense pain made her double over, and she was thrown to the ground by the rest of the orbs, which formed a ring around her body, pinning down her arms and rendering her unable to move. Planty grew three times in size and glowered down at her She now realized, in the worst way, that this was no dream.

  
“You’re so _naive_ ,” he chuckled. His smile had become a jagged maw with thorns for fangs. “A bit of advice? Never trust a stranger, especially not in the monster world. There are only two options here in the Underground: destroy, or disappear. But you should feel lucky.” Electricity pulsed through the little girl’s nerves, and she could tell that Planty had summoned more pellets – and they were getting closer. “Not that you’d have had the brains for it in the first place, but I’ve saved you from having to make the choice yourself.”

  
The little girl tried to scream as excruciating visions of misery made the edges of her world turn red. There was only room for one thought of her own: this wouldn’t be happening if her grandfather were alive. He had been the only thing between her and the mercy of a sadistic talking flower.

  
Planty chuckled as he prepared his final attack. “Stop crying. This will only hurt a lot.”

  
And then it stopped. All the pain the little girl had been in vanished, and she became full of energy as the cavern was filled with bright white light. Planty shrank back to his original size. “What?” he snarled, before a glowing flame zipped past the little girl’s face and struck him, tearing his roots from the ground and sweeping him away.

  
For the first time, the little girl could see the inside of the cavern. It was not a bleak, lifeless place. There were signs of a past civilization: crumbling columns decorated with fading gold leaf, and rusty lanterns that were now lit. At the far end there was a sort of door, two pillars holding up what must have once been an ornate arch that led further into the cave. From that door came a woman, walking briskly towards the little girl with another flame flickering in her outstretched hand.

  
“What a horrible creature!” cried the girl’s savior. “How fortunate I got here when I did. Here, human. It’s all right.” She knelt and extended her free hand. “I’m Camille, the caretaker of these ruins. I comb this place every day to see if any humans have fallen. It hasn’t happened in years, but thank goodness I have fallen into such a routine.” She helped the little girl to her feet. The brown fur that covered her body was silky and soft. “Oh my!” she murmured when she saw the girl standing. “You are just a child.”

  
Camille had horns and fur and a goat-like muzzle. She towered over the girl and was clearly not human, but her presence was not frightening. In fact, just standing near her made the little girl feel like her soul was being kindly embraced; already, it was making her forget whatever trauma she’d just gone through. Camille let her flame go out when she noticed the little girl eying it nervously. She did not speak again until the little girl did, asking what was going on.

  
“Right. You must be so overwhelmed,” said Camille, placing her paws on her knees and crouching. “This is the land of monsters. It’s very different from the world you come from, but I can help you get situated. Come.” She turned, gesturing for the little girl to follow. She projected an air of elegance as she walked, the train of her purple robes floating behind her.

  
The little girl trailed slightly behind Camille. As she passed through the door, she heard an odd noise behind her, what sounded like a soft patter of tiny feet in the dirt. She doubted it was Planty, but she ignored it and looked forward anyway. It seemed like the safe thing to do.

  
Even without Camille’s magic lighting the way, it was bright inside the place she called the ruins. Ancient monsters had made a pathway of gray stone and stacked neat layers of gray brick in front of the more organic cave walls. Vines slipped through the cracks, but they weren’t allowed to get too unruly. It wasn’t exactly how Mommy described ancient ruins, but then again, most human ruins didn’t have caretakers like Camille. Everything was impeccably dusted and polished; it nearly sparkled.

  
At the end of this first corridor there was a sealed door. Before that, there was a series of yellow switches on the wall with a sign carved into the stone above them. Camille held up one finger as the little girl tried to walk past them. “Stop right here,” she said. “This will only take a few moments.” The goat woman proceeded to flip some of the switches in quick sequence, barely even looking at which ones. A metallic _thunk_ indicated that the door was unlocked. Camille sighed and nodded in satisfaction. “Wonderful. Come along, now.”

  
The little girl glanced at the sign. _Stay on the path_ , it urged. It was only as they were leaving the room that the girl noticed the several short stones that jutted out from the pathway. Each one of them led to one of the switches that Camille had flipped. It was like the sign was giving a clue about how to open the door. Camille entered the next room and waved for the girl to follow, but the little girl stayed put. She was curious. She asked Camille what she had just done.

  
"Oh..." Camille turned to the girl with a funny expression. "I solved a riddle in order to unlock the door. There are many contraptions like that throughout the ruins so you had best get used to seeing them.”

  
The little girl asked why they were even there.

  
“Well, originally they were built as a security measure to keep out... um…” Camille looked at the little girl strangely and pressed her lips together. She raised a paw as she restarted her sentence. “They were a short-sighted attempt to keep out the people we _thought_ were our enemies. They were unnecessary and not even all that effective, but I never got around to taking them down. Now I think of them as little games.” She looked wistfully back into the room and sighed. “They're kind of the only fun I ever get around here."

  
Mommy did word puzzles like these with the little girl sometimes. She boasted that these riddles never could have stopped her if she were an enemy.

  
“Do you really think you could open one of the doors?” Camille was surprised, and she looked thoughtful as they continued.

  
They came to another long corridor with a similar sign posted on the wall. At the far end of the pathway, which was laid in a winding pattern, were a bunch of oddly-placed walls, a maze of some kind. Camille stopped short in the middle of the path and did a double take between the girl and the maze before them. She smiled at the little girl and walked back to the front of the corridor. “Go ahead,” she urged.

  
_The western room is the eastern room’s blueprint,_ read the sign. Its meaning wasn’t immediately clear to the little girl. She looked at Camille, who was staring at her with an expectant smile, and then to the labyrinth before her. She furrowed her brow. Even if she was able to solve this riddle, she was sure to get lost in the maze itself. Luckily, she didn’t have to worry about that, because she only had a moment or two to ponder the clue before Camille grabbed her hand and hurried with her through the maze.

  
“Of course, I knew this was too much to ask,” the goat woman lamented. “I am so sorry for putting pressure on you, child.” She continued to chastise herself under her breath as the little girl realized that the initial path was a mirror of the correct path through the maze.

  
She could have totally figured that out for herself.

  
As they traversed deeper into the cavern, the little girl began to notice more of the creatures who inhabited it: tiny white frogs, moths with small bodies and huge, flapping wings, slugs and beetles with human-like eyes on stalks. They weren’t scary; actually, they were kind of cute. They poked their heads out of the cracks in the wall and around corners, looking at the little girl with curiosity, and when they saw Camille they all shrank back into their hiding spots, bowing to the goat woman’s authority.

  
A little patter of feet on the stone floor began to follow the two of them, accompanied by a low growl — a row-row sort of sound — every few minutes. Something was following them and getting closer each time, but when the little girl mentioned it to Camille, she dismissed it.

  
“These ruins are totally safe. Nothing in them can harm you,” Camille said, not even bothering to look behind her. “I have made sure of this, child.”

  
They came to a corridor with cobwebs dangling from the ceiling and suddenly Camille came to a stop and held her arm out in front of her. Camille maintained her calm composure, but her fur was standing on end. “The spiders usually congregate around here,” she whispered. “Don’t be alarmed, but I advise you stay back for a moment as I inform them of your arrival. They are not dangerous, merely…” She shuddered. “…unpleasant, and I need to set some ground rules on how they shall conduct themselves around you.” Camille took a deep breath and stepped forward. She glanced back at the girl with a slight smile before proceeding into the next room with her chin raised.

  
There was a second corridor protruding from the other wall, and as the girl was standing idly in wait, she heard it again: a little patter of footsteps, a soft howling that urged her to follow. Silently, the little girl apologized to Camille for leaving and stepped into the corridor.

  
It was a dead end, leading to nothing but a square pedestal with a red bowl sitting on top of it. There was a note attached to the pedestal, reading _“Monster Candy! Please, take one.”_ At the mention of candy, the little girl realized how hungry she was. She stood on her toes, but the bowl was up too high for her to reach. She sighed loudly. And then the bowl began to shake. A piece of monster candy fell by her feet. She sat with her back against the pedestal to unwrap it and gobble it up. It was chewy and not too sweet, and she felt a huge burst of energy once she had eaten it. She wished out loud that she could get more candy and keep it in her pockets for later.

  
The bowl shook again, harder this time, until it was raining monster candy down on the little girl’s head. She laughed and held out her hands to catch it. As the last of the candy fell, she could hear the scraping of tiny feet against the plastic, accompanied by a now-familiar bark. Finally, the bowl tipped over, and a small white dog jumped out and into the little girl’s lap.

  
They took an instant liking to each other. The dog nuzzled up against the little girl’s face, drying tears she hadn’t even known she was crying with his whiskers. She giggled and scratched him behind the ears. His fur was short and mostly white, except for a messy tuft of yellowish-gray right on top of his head. He looked sort of like an old, but still sprightly, little man. The little girl looked at the dog and a presence she had been missing so much wrapped around and comforted her.

  
It was almost like he was here, alive. She knew that this dog was here to be her protector. She knew just what she would name him.

  
The little girl got to her feet and ventured back into the ruins with her new companion at her feet. Together, she and Grandpa Dog were going to find Camille, and then they would find their way home.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So that was chapter 1! I'm so happy that I finally have part of it published!
> 
> I can't make any promises as to when the next chapter will be done. I made plenty of promises to myself about when THIS chapter would be done, and Lord knows I didn't keep THOSE promises. All I can say is that I am really passionate about this project and will do my best to keep perfectionism and procrastination from getting in the way of its realization. 
> 
> I think this is gonna be a fun ride and I hope you all are excited to ride it with me.


	2. Fish Fight

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I feel like it's really obvious that this was written for NaNoWriMo and I didn't do nearly as much editing as I should have. Hopefully it's still entertaining.

They journeyed through the ruins, feeling much braver than they had before. Grandpa Dog walked slow, but the little girl was willing to slow down for him. As a result, he was never far from the little girl’s feet, tail swishing eagerly against the ground. He seemed willing to follow her wherever, which was unfortunate because as confident as she was, the little girl did not know where she was going. The only clues that she was headed in the right direction were the puzzles and locks that Camille had left solved. The switches on the wall had been flipped and welded permanently into the correct position with fire magic, doors had been propped open with large rocks, and deliberate claw marks in the dirt directed the little girl through the mazes.

  
It was all a little condescending. The girl picked out at least three riddles she could have figured out just fine on her own.

  
They had wandered quite a bit before they finally saw a sign of the spiders. Nothing had happened when they’d passed through the cobweb-infested corridor that had Camille so worried, but there were more cobwebs scattered throughout the ruins and eventually they came to one on a wall with a little paper stuck to it. The little girl read it out loud:

  
**Spider Bake Sale. Spider cider donuts, 20G each. Buy ten, get one free – limited offer! Give us your money today, or regret it later! 😊**

  
An enormous red spider the size of her fist burrowed out of a hole in the ground. It bowed its head to the girl, clicking pincers and all, and held out two of its fuzzy arms expectantly. The little girl yelped and backed away quickly. She wasn’t afraid of spiders — her uncle told her that they were a vital part of the ecosystem — but this one made her feel itchy and slimy all over. She didn’t have any money, either, and she didn’t like what the sign implied.   
  
She was halfway down the corridor when she noticed that Grandpa Dog wasn’t following her. He was hunkered down in front of the spider, growling at it. He was larger than it, if just barely, so it scurried back into its hole with a hiss. Even when it was gone, Grandpa Dog continued to glare at the hole, sticking his nose down it and daring the spider to come back until the little girl beckoned for him.  
  
The little girl didn’t think much of it at first, but as the pair continued through the ruins, it became clear that this tiny dog was much more aggressive than she would expect such a tiny thing to be. The monsters that lived there were less wary of her now that she wasn’t accompanied by Camille. They approached her curiously. The ones who could speak even tried chatting with her. But Grandpa Dog chased all of them away.

  
In one room, they found a cloth dummy on a wooden stick propped up against the corner wall. It was scuffed up, its fabric lightly singed, and clearly hadn’t been used in a while, and the little girl deduced that it was something Camille used to practice wielding her fire magic, like the targets Daddy used at the gun range. Grandpa Dog seemed to take this as a suggestion. He jumped against the wooden stick, sending the dummy’s support clattering to the ground. He made quick work of the dummy, ripping off its snout with his teeth before the little girl could stop him, shaking stuffing everywhere while he clawed at the doll’s torso.

  
The little girl scolded him. He would have been great to have around with Planty, but now he had her worried.

  
They had just passed through an invisible maze that Camille had graciously marked when a great rumble echoed through the halls of the ruins. Grandpa Dog ground to a halt right in front of the little girl’s feet and barked in the noise’s direction. For the first time, the little girl truly felt safer having him there with her. But walking towards the sound was the only way to proceed. She cautiously beckoned for Grandpa Dog to follow her.

  
The rumbles grew deeper as they proceeded, to the point where some of the bricks were coming loose from the walls. One doorway was practically crumbling from the vibrations, and from that and the volume, the little girl deduced that the source must have been beyond it.

  
And there it was: a long white sheet was spread over the ground from wall to wall. It billowed and fell with every deafening rumble that shook the ruins. Whatever the sheet was covering must have been making the sound. Grandpa Dog ran to the corner and frantically yipped as the little girl knelt to lift it. She did not feel silk or cotton; rather, her fingers felt like they were dipped in cold water as they phased right through the sheet. The deafening noise continued to echo, but it changed – almost like a voice. “Oh… good…” it groaned. “I can still feel pain…”

  
The little girl stumbled backwards as the sheet began to float off the ground. It certainly looked solid, but pieces of it disappeared and reappeared through the walls and the solid ground as it moved, until it was towering over the child, staring down at her with sunken tired eyes. This was not a sheet.

  
A ghost! The little girl screamed.

  
“I should feel happy to be acknowledged…” said the ghost, his voice a disaffected drone. “…but of course, it’s only because someone needs me out of their way… And I was snoring too, wasn’t I?... Of course… I apologize… I don’t even need to sleep but… I do… for twenty hours a day… It’s the closest I’ll ever get to that sweet reward all the other monsters can look forward to… death…”

  
Grandpa Dog was still yipping and growling madly. But the little girl was not afraid. The ghost’s long, amorphous body hunched over pitifully, and the look on his simple face was sad. She smiled at him and told him that she understood. Everyone deserves a good nap.

  
“…not Fishtablook… My very existence is a hindrance to others…”

  
She told him it wasn’t a problem and explained that they were looking for Camille.

  
At the sound of the goat woman’s name, Fishtablook’s frown deepened. “…Oh… oh no…. Camille…” His eyes began to quiver. “…I can’t believe I forgot…” Milky ghost tears started to well up. “I… SUCK…” he wailed, truly letting loose. Huge tears rolled down his body and hit the ground, making an audible splash before solidifying into smaller droplets that rolled around on the floor like marbles. The little girl realized too late just how many teardrops there were bouncing around her, and when one struck her behind the knee she found herself tripping and flailing her arms to keep her balance.

  
“She’ll be… so mad at me!” Fishtablook started to convulse, shaking what could be called his head. “She’ll never… ever… buy snails from me again!”

  
The little girl crossed her arms in front of her face to block the flying tears, which were falling faster and faster and in greater volume. She couldn’t stop them from knocking her onto her behind. Grandpa Dog panicked and ran to her. He bit the hem of her leggings and tried to drag her back into the previous room. When he realized there was no moving her, he howled and started running towards Fishtablook. The little girl didn’t know if he could even hurt a ghost, but she didn’t want to find out. She scrambled to pull Grandpa Dog back.  

  
“It’s my job… It’s the one thing I’m supposed to be good at… I… _SUCK_!”

  
The little girl cleared her throat and shouted as loud as she could for Fishtablook’s attention.

  
“What….” he said dismissively as tears continued to roll down his hollow cheeks. “If you have something to say to me… know it will fall on deaf ears…”

  
The little girl did what Mommy always did for her when she cried: she told him a joke about skeletons.  
“Huh?” Fishtablook gaped dow

n at her. Smaller teardrops still dripped from the wisps of what looked like a beard, but he had stopped crying. That was something.

  
So she told him another joke. She asked him what another name for the shin bone was.

  
“I… don’t know…”

  
She said the punchline: _Tibia-nest, I don’t remember!_

  
“Heh…  My sense of humor tends more to the fatalistic… and I don’t have a skeleton… but… that was a good one… Wow, I can’t believe someone could be so amicable to a loony old ghost like me…” His gray eyes shifted to the floor. “Though I suppose Camille does have some kindness in her heart… You said you were looking for her? Follow me… I know where her house is…”

  
Grandpa Dog was still growling at him, but the little girl picked him up and excitedly followed their new friend through the ruins. The air around Fishtablook was cold and whistled as he passed through it. He knew this route well, it seemed, barely glancing up from the floor. He didn’t even acknowledge the half a dozen or so completed puzzles they passed by.

  
“Funny… There are usually more things to phase through…” He noticed the little girl looking at him curiously. “I come to the ruins because Camille is our best customer…” he explained. “But one day it dawned on me… it’s a really good place to be alone… I spend a lot of time here by myself now, roaming the corridors and allowing my immortality and incorporeality to drive me mad… but consequently I forget why I came here in the first place…..”

  
The little girl tried to reassure him that everyone forgets once in a while.

  
“This is the third time in the past two months…” Fishtablook turned away from her. “Sorry to bore you to death with such… personal details.”

  
The winding pathways of rooms finally gave way to an open field. Ruins of a huge city lay beyond the field, and right in the center of it all was a tiny brick cottage. The tall woman wringing her paws in the doorway was instantly recognizable, and she walked swiftly across the field the moment she saw the little girl.

  
“Oh my goodness, there you are!” Camille met them under the single bare tree that stood in the open. “I was so worried about you.” She knelt and gave the little girl a big, soft hug. “But you were able to follow my clues, that’s good.” She pulled away and started methodically running her paws over the child’s body, looking for injuries. “Ugh, I’m never leaving you alone again.”

  
It was okay, the little girl told her, because she found a new friend who helped protect her. When Camille released her from the hug, she held Grandpa Dog up to her muzzle.

  
“Yes, of course! Mr. Blook,” said Camille, “thank you for bringing her home. If you weren’t incorporeal, I could kiss you.”

  
“I had the snails, but… the spiders stole them from me while I was napping….” said Fishtablook as he retreated slightly from Camille. “Sorry…”

  
Camille grinned. “Sorry for what? This is worth so much more than snails. You have been an exceptional help, Mr. Blook.”

  
“Oh no…” said Fishtablook. “I find the praise a bit too sincere for comfort…” Tears welled up in his eyes again.“Oh no…” He started to fade away, his voice echoing. “I’ll send the other delivery boy next time… I promise… Oh, oh no…”

  
Once he was gone, Camille sighed. “Poor fellow. I just don’t know what to do with him,” she said, shaking her head. She turned to the little girl.  “Now, I think you’ve had enough unsupervised play time for one day. Come along.” She reached down and took one of the girl’s hands in her paw, forcing her to drop Grandpa Dog.

  
The little girl looked down at him as he walked by her side and frowned. How odd that Camille hadn’t acknowledged Grandpa Dog at all.

  
She was not overwhelmed by warmth when they entered the cottage. Camille’s decorating style steered towards the monochromatic; there were nothing but shades of gray and silver in the foyer, with an occasional pop of purple or blue to break it up. The light fixtures were sleek and shiny but were dated in style. The place was in excellent shape for what was obviously a very old house, to the point where, apart from a sweet, tempting aroma that filled the room, it felt completely sterile. Not lived in at all. The little girl wondered if Camille had anything else to do besides clean up and do repairs.

  
In the far corner of the foyer, there was a wooden banister that hid a flight of stairs. Camille gestured for the little girl to follow her down the harshly lit hallway, but Grandpa Dog had other ideas and immediately scampered towards the staircase. The little girl had to follow him to make sure he didn’t stray. She found him sitting patiently on the third stair down, waiting for her so they could descend into the dark together. She balked at the sight and urged Grandpa Dog to come back. He responded by going yet a few steps lower. The little girl took a tentative step after him, gripping the banister as she whistled for him to come back up. But he was a stubborn dog, and if it weren’t for the furry, silk-clad arm that pulled her back, he might have led the little girl all the way down.

  
Camille’s face was stern when the little girl turned around. “Listen to me, child. I want this to be a good home for you. But in my house there are rules to abide, and the most important one is that you are not to go into the basement. Now, I ought to show you to your bedroom.” She took the girl by the hand and led her into the hallway.

  
The little girl looked behind her to make sure Grandpa Dog was following. He did, after staying put just long enough to draw the little girl’s gaze back to the staircase. There was something important down there, she just knew it. Grandpa Dog wouldn’t lead her astray.

  
Camille had to retrieve the key to the bedroom from a potted plant. When she opened the door, the little girl was struck by how different it was from the rest of the house. It was cozy and painted a warm shade of red. It was also clearly neglected; nobody had dusted here for quite a while.

  
“I’m sure you’d like to get some rest after your little adventure today. There’s another surprise waiting for you when you wake up.” Camille’s silhouette in the doorway was radiant as she hesitated there. “I spoke too harshly for someone as small as you, didn’t I?” she said softly. “I am truly sorry. It is just imperative that you stay out of the basement. It is not safe down there for a child.” And with that thought, she closed the door.

  
The little girl sat on the bed, sending a thick layer of dust flying off the blanket. Grandpa Dog curled up by her feet. The bed was cozy and seemed like a good place to spend the night. But even though it had been a long and eventful journey to get here, the little girl wasn’t tired at all. Restlessly, she stood up and snooped around the room. She went to the toy chest first, but found nothing inside except an old telescope. It had been broken in half. She wondered if there was something more interesting in the closet, but there was nothing inside it but clothes, all of them much too big for her.

  
There was a framed photograph on the wall above the bed. Grandpa Dog was already bored, heeling by the door and whimpering to be let out, but the little girl was still curious. She could see Camille’s long, lovely face in the picture, but the person standing next to her was covered in dust. The little girl clambered onto the bed and blew the dust away, and she almost fell backwards when she saw who else was in the picture.

  
It was another girl. Another _human_ girl.


End file.
